Consequence of Unilateral Vestibular Loss on Visual Abilities

Unilateral vestibular lesions are frequent and disabling pathologies causing a set of oculomotor, postural and perceptual symptoms. These symptoms reduce over time according to a vestibular compensation. However, vestibular compensation should be considered as a set of sub-processes whose duration and recovery level differ. Indeed, after a unilateral vestibular loss, some functions remain asymmetrical as a long-term effect, and these disorders may be observed among patients with no functional complaints. Balance disorders may persist in some patients. The equilibration consists in handling real-time a considerable amount of information coming from the environment and the subject himself, allowing an adaptation of the position and movements of his body to satisfy the needs of posture, balance and orientation. This information comes mainly from the vision, the vestibule and the somesthesic system. It is pre-treated and harmonized in the brainstem, before being transmitted to the higher brain centres. Brain centers thus learn about peripheral conditions. According to these and the project of the movement, brain centers address in response orders to ophtalmological and motor effectors ensuring look, posture and balance to be provided. The eye is a cornerstone of the balancing system through the retina, an environmental sensor, and its extraocular muscles, effectors of the system. The aim of this study is to assess the effects of acute unilateral vestibular loss on visual abilities evaluated by orthoptic balance in patients who presented acute unilateral vestibular loss by surgical deafferentation (removal of vestibular schwannoma, vestibular neurotomy or surgical labyrinthectomy for Meniere's disease), during the early phase and decline of vestibular compensation. Our secondary objective is to evaluate the effect of a pre-existing anomaly of the visual abilities evaluated by orthoptic assessment on the vestibular compensation capacities. All in all, this study seems